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He had come to the supermarket several times before, so he was barely familiar with the town.

He parked his motorcycle outside a relatively large veterinary drugstore and went in.

The weather was dreary today, leaving the shop somewhat dim. The owner lounged behind the counter, watching short videos on his phone.

When he saw Shi Wen enter, the owner gave him an extra look and greeted him in less-than-standard Mandarin. "What are you buying?"

Shi Wen took out his phone and checked the notes he had made the night before. "I need disinfectant for livestock sheds. What chlorine-based disinfectants do you have?"

The owner pointed at a row of shelves. "They're all here. See which kind you want. Quicklime is down below."

Shi Wen looked at the owner, then at the shelves.

This shop did not have a particularly complete selection of disinfectants, but it carried several major categories, such as peroxides, aldehydes, phenols, and chlorine-based disinfectants.

Standing before the shelves, Shi Wen found himself spoiled for choice.

After looking for a while, he compared the products against his notes and checked their prices. In the end, he selected two buckets of relatively recent Xiaoteling, sodium dichloroisocyanurate disinfectant, along with two bags of quicklime.

The owner totaled the bill for him. "Hey, kid, are you from out of town?"

Shi Wen smiled. "You could tell? Have a lot of outsiders come here lately?"

"With a face like yours, if I don't remember you, then I definitely haven't seen you before." After answering the first question, the owner answered the second. "Not a whole lot of outsiders, but not exactly few either. Don't you young people talk about going back to the countryside to raise sheep or something? You came back to the countryside too, right?"

Shi Wen said, "More or less."

The owner turned off his phone. "What do you mean, more or less? You definitely did. Which family are you from?"

Shi Wen said, "Shi Family Ranch, just outside town."

"I vaguely remember it. That ranch had been empty for a long time. I thought they'd moved away."

"No. We came back."

Shi Wen quickly paid for his things, carried them out, strapped them onto the back of his motorcycle, then went to the supermarket to buy groceries.

The refrigerator at home still worked. Buying vegetables in town every day was too much trouble, so he usually bought enough for a week, mainly vegetables that kept well, like cabbage, tomatoes, potatoes, and carrots.

Shi Wen wandered around town for over an hour. He also had a bowl of lamb noodles for lunch before finally riding home.

Once home, he put the vegetables away in the refrigerator first, then began cleaning the livestock shed.

He had already cleaned the shed once early that morning, sweeping out cow and sheep dung and other debris, then washing it down with water.

Now that the ground had dried completely, he began spreading limewater.

Lime was the most commonly used disinfectant here. It was cheap and fairly effective, so there was no need to be stingy with it.

Shi Wen changed into a set of old work clothes, put on a mask, plain glasses, and a hat, then efficiently mixed slaked lime in a dedicated bucket.

The internet said that lime had to be measured precisely: one kilogram of lime to 350 milliliters of water. If the ratio was wrong, the disinfection would not work well, and all the effort would be wasted.

After mixing the lime, Shi Wen disinfected the floors and walls inside and outside the livestock shed and the areas where the animals moved about. Then he mixed Xiaoteling to disinfect places where lime could not be easily sprayed, such as the feed troughs and water troughs.

The ranch was large, and he was working alone. By the time he finished, it was nearly dark.

Since he was alone, he had no interest in cooking. He boiled two handfuls of noodles, ate them hastily, then lay on the bed and read.

Early the next morning, Shi Wen took out a hammer, nails, and other tools, intending to repair the livestock shed and the dilapidated areas outside the house, as well as replace some of the pipes.

Halfway through the work, his phone rang. The caller was Fu Meng, the village chief's neighbor whom he had met before.

Shi Wen answered, and Fu Meng's voice came through. "Hey, Shi Wen, didn't you say you wanted lambs? There's a market today. Are you going? I'm heading there anyway. If you are, I'll come pick you up."

"I'm going!" Shi Wen immediately replied. "Thanks, Brother Fu. When are you coming?"

Fu Meng said, "I'm about to leave. Wait at home. I'll be there in ten minutes."

Shi Wen hurriedly put away his tools, took off his protective work gloves, and went back inside to change into something more presentable.

Just as he finished getting ready, he heard a vehicle outside the door.

Shi Wen opened the door and saw that Fu Meng had arrived outside the ranch on a three-wheeled motorcycle.

He immediately jogged from in front of the house to the entrance of the ranch.

Fu Meng smiled. "I was just about to call for you, and you came out. The back is a little dirty. Want to sit beside me?"

The cargo bed of the three-wheeler was covered in mud and fodder, as well as flattened dry dung. It had clearly been used often to haul cattle and sheep, so it was indeed not a good place for a person to sit.

Shi Wen got into the vehicle and sat on the cushion beside Fu Meng, raising a hand to grip the frame. "Thanks, Brother Fu."

Fu Meng said, "Why be so polite? It's on the way."

Fu Meng drove the three-wheeler toward town, its engine puttering along.

The cattle and sheep market was also in town, but farther down from the town center, some distance away from the main street.

Shi Wen had only visited the main street before and had never gone to the cattle and sheep market.

As they got closer to the market, there were more and more three-wheelers and light trucks on the road. Traffic grew increasingly congested, and the noise became more and more chaotic.

There were also more and more livestock, including cattle and sheep. Some were being transported, some were being herded, and they were everywhere. The distinctive smell of livestock thickened in the air as well.

Before long, Shi Wen saw people selling adult sheep by the roadside.

Adult sheep and lambs were not sold in the same place. Since he had come to buy lambs today, he needed to go farther inside.

Fu Meng parked the three-wheeler in a designated parking area and walked into the cattle and sheep market with Shi Wen. "Shi Wen, have you eaten breakfast? Want something to eat?"

Outside the cattle and sheep market, all kinds of stalls were lined up—sheep offal soup, beef noodles, mutton-fat buns, hot milk tea, yogurt bowls, and more.

Shi Wen inhaled the mingled scents. "Let's eat something, Brother Fu. What do you want?"

Fu Meng said, "How about lamb rice noodles? I'll take you to an old shop."

The two went to a lamb rice noodle shop.

The sheep had been freshly slaughtered local sheep, with none of the usual gaminess. Instead, it carried a faint milky fragrance and was incredibly tender. Paired with chili oil and pickled radish, it was wonderfully appetizing.